Savonarola raised his eyes and said very quietly:--
'Messere, what think you? do you believe that the Holy Father and our lord has faith in Christ?'
Ricciardo allowed this unseemly question to pass without reply; he continued to dilate on his mission, giving the prior to understand that if he submitted himself, the red hat of a cardinal awaited him in Rome; then, bowing a second time, and touching Savonarola's hand with his lips, he added insinuatingly:--
'One little word, Father Girolamo, one little word, and the red hat is yours.'
Savonarola fixed his unflinching eyes on the speaker, and said slowly:--
'And if I refuse to submit, Messere? If I refuse to hold my peace? If the infatuated monk prefer to continue his barkings as the faithful watch-dog of the house of God?'
Raising his eyebrows in a faint grimace, Messer Ricciardo looked at the monk, then turned his eyes to his beautiful almond-shaped nails, and adjusted his priceless rings. Presently he drew slowly from his pocket, unfolded, and handed to the prior a bull of excommunication, to which nothing was lacking but the papal seal. In it Savonarola was called the son of perdition, 'the most contemptible of insects' _neauissimus omnipedum_.
'And you are waiting for an answer?' asked the monk quietly, when he had read the document.
The Scriptor assented with a light nod of his head.
Savonarola rose, and flung the bull at the feet of the emissary.
'There,' he said, 'there is my answer! Return to Rome and tell him who has sent you that I accept his challenge. Minister of Antichrist! We shall see whether he will excommunicate me, or whether it is I who shall drive him out of the pale of the Church!'
The door of the cell was softly opened and showed the head of Fra Domenico who, hearing the sonorous voice, was anxious to know what could be taking place. The monks were massed round the entrance.
Messer Ricciardo, who had cast several furtive glances at the door, now said politely:--
'May I remind you, Fra Girolamo, that I am charged only with a private mission?'
Savonarola moved to the door, and throwing it wide he cried:--'Hear all of ye; for not only to you but to the whole people of Florence I will proclaim the infamous traffic which has been proposed to me, choice between the cardinal's purple and the excommunication of the _Curia Romana_!' Under his low forehead his sunken eyes shone like coals; his ill-shaped lower jaw, trembling with wrath and almost satanic hatred and pride.